Rob1956

My clan Coat-of-Arms Scotland
23 Mar 2019
11:45:43pm

re: Part Border line missing

Hi Pooh

It is a broken frame line, there is no record of this variety in the catalogues, there are many varieties with the sesquicentennial stamps that are not listed as there are so many. The KGVI full face 3d blue and 3d brown stamps from 1937 - 1941 are fraught with varieties listed and unlisted.

Rob

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re: Part Border line missing

I don't know if these NSW 2d sesqui stamps were collected on purpose but so far I have a Koala up a tree, broken frame line, a couple of pantaloons, these stamps apparently came from overseas and a couple of mint ones and a couple of others all for very little money.

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Rob1956

My clan Coat-of-Arms Scotland
24 Mar 2019
10:39:31am

re: Part Border line missing

Hi Pooh

It is a possibility that the collection of 2d sesquicentennial stamps you have have come from a collection, I have known of people buying cheaply only to realise later they are in possession of scarce or rare stamps.

I know of a collector who had found two of Australia's rarest stamps from buying a couple of stamps cheaply overseas.

Rob

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Rob1956

My clan Coat-of-Arms Scotland
25 Mar 2019
05:14:43pm

re: Part Border line missing

Hi Pooh

As the Sesquicentennial stamps were made in the great depression (1929-1939), the printers would not have been financial to update the printing presses and the staff would have been “restructured” so only a skeleton crew would be running the presses; there would be a few employees who would be highly experienced in visually checking the sheets, but with a skeleton staff, many minor varieties would have escaped detection, but the major varieties would have been a different kettle of fish.

These stamps were made in the great depression, and I doubt the staff was going to be picky with slight errors as the replacement of watermarked paper and ink would have been too expensive and difficult to replace.

Your stamp is known as a minor variety, being an error that may occur only to one or more stamps but not important enough to be taken as a major variety, but it is a variety and there are many collectors who will collect these errors.

Varieties such as the “Pantaloon”, Man with tail” and “Koala in tree” are constant and the position of the stamp on the sheet is recorded by the printer and normally would be removed as it visually affects the stamp, some of these errors escape detection and end up being shipped out with the approved sheets.

I have a block of 16 2d Sesquicentennial commemoratives in mint unhinged condition with all three major errors plus a new error that was discovered only recently; these blocks are quite rare as they should never have seen the light of day, but as mentioned before, it was in the great depression and staff was cut to a minimum so quality control was not efficient; and then came WWII which would have further shortened staff numbers.

After the war, it took a few years before life in the Notre Printing Branch got back to “normal”, errors “roller flaw” errors, both being scarce to very rare. There was even for a short time experimentation with thin paper, but it turned out that more ink was used as the paper absorbed the ink (the ink used for stamps were very expensive), so the printed resorted back to the regular thick paper.

Rob

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